Maybe just because there is no "economic" value in caring for one's family doesn't mean it is not valuable. It just shows how screwed up our current "economic" model is.

9:05 am September 12, 2011

chandrapathak wrote:

Nice article.One factor must also be taken into account ,while accounting women leaving half way is :culturally we Indians prefer our women to remain free of financial worries and live happily if the man is earning enough to meet money requirements of the family .

9:13 am September 12, 2011

ThinkBeforeYouLeap wrote:

It amazes me how just many people infer just from the fact that the percentage of women is lesser equals "gender inequality". Gender inequality can occur only if there is a specific bias or discrimination against women getting promoted or getting specific jobs in spite of having the required qualifications. Lesser percentage of women does not equal gender inequality. It only implies a specific pattern brought about by social adjustments and preferences, for e.g. iron workers are about 90% men. Does that imply that there is gender inequality in this profession? In child-care centers, 95% employees are women. Does that imply there is gender inequality? This article does not indicate anything other than a specific interesting pattern among genders. There is no gender inequality to be concluded from this pattern, unless one has an expectation for that which causes one to infer wrongly.

9:52 am September 12, 2011

jay wrote:

india always give chance to women. even america has never gave a chance to a women to go up as India. a women should prove in the battle ground she is strong. otherwise what is the point

9:55 pm September 12, 2011

BurningIndianBrides wrote:

@Jay. You mean Indians burn them.

10:21 pm September 12, 2011

Aravind Bappanadu wrote:

The author needs to research better before writing articles. The point made by ThinkBeforeYouLeap points to fundamental flaw in the article.
I would like to point out some more flaws:
"... less than a million new jobs were created despite the nation’s rapid economic expansion." If fewer people are working and yet the family is able to earn more, then it is a highly desirable situation. You need to show that these people who leave the workforce are actually poorer for it.

Women having the flexibility not to work is a luxury that speaks of a prospering economy. Listen to Elizabeth Warren for the situations of families in the USA where women have no choice but to work (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akVL7QY0S8A). There is a heavy cost to having multi-income families and one must consider this before advocating for more women in the work force.

9:20 am September 14, 2011

Barns wrote:

Thanks as always for another interesting and thought-provoking piece. A couple of thoughts:

1) Could the 'drop-off' between junior and middle levels mentioned simply be a result of the fact that more young women are going to work now than middle-aged women? That's to say, aren't middle-aged women of a generation in which those societal pressures are stronger, meaning they are both less likely to stay in work and were less likely to start work in the first place?

2) Judging from the women on my Twitter timeline who don't work, most seem quite happy in their role as carers and derive satisfaction and a sense of meaning/contribution from it. Admittedly that's a tiny, quite well-off sliver of society, but I think it's important to note that those societal pressures are in some cases not pressures at all.

Still, I can relate my own experience working in India to this trend. Percentages would have been similar in my workplace to those listed here, and the vast majority of women had no real ambition to forge a career path. (This was in conservative south Kerala.)

7:01 pm September 15, 2011

scorpio wrote:

From what I have seen, Indian women are lazy, they are used to spending hubby's money
For anyone, why wud u work if you can have same life without working? in Western countries mostly women have to work, but that's not the case in india.
When women work..they try to find out easy ways and short cuts to get things done. I have seen very very few professional hard working women in work force!

8:27 pm September 15, 2011

anishsalutes wrote:

Dropout happens sometimes as a compulsory company police too. For instance,the women working in Airline Industry as getting aged and skin getting wrinkled would be replaced by new younger glamour gals.May be a wonder we do not see them any more at the middle management of the Airline industry as a very few can be accomodated at that arena.Hence industries like cosmetics,fashion ,textile,film where women population are more are facing compulsory dropout due to this causes.

1:24 pm September 18, 2011

observer wrote:

in the 21st century,the differences in a man's role versus a woman's has steadily diminished. men and women alike can obtain an education and a job with the job comes.financial independance. with growing inflation and a desire for a better quality of life, working couples have become very common. employers demand the same from both men and women in the global knowledge economy. and,according to 'the economist', east asian working women are increasingly choosing to remain single. they don't want to be burdened with family and taking care of in-laws. it s well known that among couples, women do more of the work at home than men. on average. indian women are not yet choosing to remain single in large numbers yet,largely due to cultural and traditional factors. but it could happen. so far, it appears that many indian women are choosing to give up jobs to raise a family and take care of in-laws.

4:05 am September 19, 2011

observer wrote:

the facts-
arranged marriage is the norm in india. traditional marriages are being challenged by on line dating and 'hybrids'. the couples meet,fall in love and agree to marry. but the two families fix everything up. it ends in a wedding,in his family's and her family's tradition and ends in a wedding reception with a combination of speeches, rock, regional indian music(punjabi,bengali, tamil, telugu, kannada and so on), bollywood songs and dance.children out of wedlock are extremely uncommon. in contrast 66 percent of iceland and over 50 percent of swedish women have kids out of wedlock.

marriage rates are falling worldwide. people in asia marry even later than in the west.in japan one third of all women in their 30s are unmarried.. 15 percent of them may never marry. in most asian societies, the woman is the caregiver for children, parents and in-laws. in japan, she works 40 hours a week and 30 hours more at home. the husbands contribute about 3 hours a week. then there is cut throat competition for places in schools.the burden mostly falls on her.
lifetime employment for men has collapsed. women have to work too to make ends meet.
98 percent of south asians tie the knot.
women are expected to give up their jobs on childbirth. they return to work after the kids have grown, if at all.
mass migration from rural to urban areas is creating a social upheaval in asia.

30 percent of taiwanese weddings involve a foreign woman.illitierate teenagers are sold to old, rich foreigners by their families.

selective sex abortion is a serious problem both in india and china.

4:32 am September 19, 2011

observer wrote:

indian women,like most women, tend to marry 'up'. there are more women than men in india. the ranks of the educated women and uneducated and ill-educated men is growing. the chance of a match is dim. educated and independant women choose to remain single. the families stop forcing them to marry. there are more men than women in india. soon indian men might have to import foreign brides(illiterate teenagers sold by their families to older men ?).

12:20 am September 24, 2011

Anonymous wrote:

can i make a point tat even if a married women want to go back to work how many of the recruiters are interested in hirng them...(getting married and childbirth does not mean that they wont be good performers or less potential )...does this not contribute to the so called drop out of women workforce.

7:59 pm October 22, 2011

indianwoman wrote:

I am an Engineer and a woman. I had to quit in my 40's because I have a muscular disorder. This is not so with many women. .My feeling and opinion is many women in India leave their jobs/career because of several handicaps. No proper childcare facilities, no support from spouse and family, family and society preferring men to work rather than women, elderly care, They are forced and coerced into leaving their jobs. Once they want to return after a break,it is nearly impossible to do so. There are inadequate home based jobs. Its more of earning than an actual career.
Recruiters as well as many companies, don't prefer them. It is impossible to change your line of work in India. Once you are in a line/domain after finishing college, you are still in it when you retire. There is no flexibility or change. Even though more and more educated men are helping their spouses keep their career, it is very very low. That is why we must encourage and help in all possible ways for each and every women to continue in their career. No wonder ,modern women refuse to marry . Marriage as an institution is dying slowly

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